paper

Testing Scalar-Tensor Gravity Using Space Gravitational-Wave Interferometers

arXiv:gr-qc/0109044 · doi:10.1103/PhysRevD.65.042002

Abstract

We calculate the bounds which could be placed on scalar-tensor theories of gravity of the Jordan, Fierz, Brans and Dicke type by measurements of gravitational waveforms from neutron stars (NS) spiralling into massive black holes (MBH) using LISA, the proposed space laser interferometric observatory. Such observations may yield significantly more stringent bounds on the Brans-Dicke coupling parameter ωthan are achievable from solar system or binary pulsar measurements. For NS-MBH inspirals, dipole gravitational radiation modifies the inspiral and generates an additional contribution to the phase evolution of the emitted gravitational waveform. Bounds on ωcan therefore be found by using the technique of matched filtering. We compute the Fisher information matrix for a waveform accurate to second post-Newtonian order, including the effect of dipole radiation, filtered using a currently modeled noise curve for LISA, and determine the bounds on ωfor several different NS-MBH canonical systems. For example, observations of a 1.4 solar mass NS inspiralling to a 1000 solar mass MBH with a signal-to-noise ratio of 10 could yield a bound of ω> 240,000, substantially greater than the current experimental bound of ω> 3000.

18 pages, 4 figures, 1 table; to be submitted to Phys. Rev. D

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